Introduction: Flickering Lives in Time

I have been thinking for years now of how I can be of service to the world. I’ve known the great need for a long time, but just recently am seeing how I may respond to that need in a way that is appropriate and fulfilling for me. Writing this blog is part of that response. Through writing here I hope to clarify for myself, as well as share with you (my family and friends, and people that I care about), some of my understandings about this time of great upheaval and turmoil in our world. I want to reflect not so much ( though perhaps a little!) on how we arrived at this convergence of crises, this precipice of disaster where the survival of life (or at least human life, among many other life forms) on this planet is tenuous at best. I, instead, will explore how to move through these challenges gracefully, choosing to really look at where we are as a culture, as a species. I am most interested in how our perceptions of ourselves ( collectively and individually) influence our actions, and how they have done so throughout time. I will write about how we can see this current moment in history not as a death, not a doomsday, but rather as a chance for truly realizing who we are and taking that knowing into our bones, allowing it to transform us and propel us into a way of being that is in concert with Life. I believe that this realization is the most necessary change that needs to occur so that we may continue to live on our cherished planet Earth.

This is big stuff, writing about this.... I’m not prepared for it. I don’t know the answers. I’m just a busy mom. A woman. I’m just a sister. I’m just a daughter. A friend. Lover. Human. A body, a mammal, a creature of blood and bones and brain, of hair and air and water, of heat, of fire, of carbon, of star dust. I’m life, watching itself, wanting to save itself, wanting to live.
Being in touch with life’s history empowers and energizes. John Seed writes, in his "Invocation", " Fill us with a sense of immense time so that our brief flickering lives may truly reflect the work of vast ages past and also the millions of years of evolution whose potential lies in our trembling hands." Our individual lives are brief, especially seen through the evolutionary lens. We may feel small compared to the vastness of time. Or we may, in looking at the evolution of the universe, see that we are that same life that burst forth at Big Bang, we are that cosmic dust, the same particles and fire that are the stars. Our personal lives, our bodies, minds, spirits are grounded in this moment. But we have only arrived here now by way of life birthing new life through grandparents and great-grandparents, ancestors so far back we can hardly stretch our minds back to then, when life first emerged on this planet, let alone that first flickering forth of the universe...
Yet, here we spin, living our daily lives. Most times we are oblivious to our connection with eons of history, with eons of life. We wash the dishes. We zip off to work. We drink and eat. We feel annoyed by our kids.We worry about things like the split ends in our hair, or the fact that our house looks imperfect, or our car is missing a hub cap. We forget that we are so much more than these small details. We don’t realize that our hands move across those dishes the same way our grandmothers did, and hers before her. Those hands that wiped tears and brought kindness and comfort to so many. Those hands that were once fins. Those tears that were once sea water. I try to remember this. I waver between feeling myself to be only my little personal life and that much bigger life, the life that is the same as a star. I flicker between selves. Most of us want something more than daily routines. We hope , perhaps, to shed some brightness of our own on our planet home. I sit here remembering what came before me. I sit here writing, giving this writing as my prayer, hoping our human lives on earth don’t flicker out before we have the chance to flicker into flame, brilliant, bold, vital like our life-giving sun-star.